The 5 Biggest Mistakes I Made as a Sports Parent and How You Can Avoid Them!

Parents and coaches: How are their jobs different?

Parents and coaches should be on the same team in youth sports. They should both be all about helping kids grow, learn, and have fun in competition, but that is where the similarities should end.

The Coach’s Job

Although a coach may have a child on the team, his job during practice and games is not to be a parent to his players. A coach’s job should focus on:

teaching skills

creating team unity and focusing on the team as a whole

helping kids see that hard work can be fun

stretching kids to grow in character

pushing the kids to perform to the best of their ability

coaching the team to play hard and hopefully win

communicating to parents (not during practices and games!)

The Parent’s Job

On the other hand, the parent’s job is to support his child, the entire team, and the coach. Period.

Unfortunately, most parents do not stick to their job description. They blur the lines and step over into the coach’s territory and take over some of his jobs. You’ve probably seen it:

Parents that shout and coach from the sidelines

Parents that insist their child work on his skills outside of practice and games

Parents that compare, complain and disrupt team unity

Parents and Coaches: Partners FOR kids

When parents and coaches “play” on the same team and do what is best for the kids–not what is best for their egos or insecurities–then the real winners of the game are our kids.

I am totally convinced that if parents and coaches focused on being partners–each one doing his own job–and worked together for the good of their young athletes, then youth sports would be much more enjoyable for everyone involved.

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Do you want your child to have a positive youth sports experience?

Meet Janis B. Meredith

I am a youth sportsparenting blogger, podcaster, and parent coach. I help busy and often overwhelmed sports parents by providing resources to guide them as they strive to give their children a positive and growing youth sports experience.